Air bearing sliders have been extensively used in disc drives to appropriately position a transducing head above a rotating disc. The transducing head is typically carried by the slider. Conventionally, head positioning is accomplished by operating an actuator arm with a large-scale actuation motor, such as a voice coil motor (VCM), to radially position the slider over a track on a disc. Typically, disc drive systems include a suspension assembly attached to the actuator arm for supporting and positioning the slider. The suspension assembly includes a load beam attached to the actuator arm and a gimbal disposed at the opposite end of the load beam. A flex circuit material is attached to the gimbal and the actuator arm. The air bearing slider carrying the transducing head is mounted to the flex circuit material. This type of suspension assembly is used with both magnetic and nonmagnetic discs. The VCM rotates the actuator arm and the suspension assembly to position the transducing head over a desired radial track of the disc.
In order for the disc drive to read and write data from the transducing head, conductive traces are disposed along the flex circuit material of the suspension assembly for the disc drive to electrically communicate with the slider. The traces extend along the gimbal and end at flex on suspension (FOS) bond pads formed adjacent to the slider. The slider has a forward face with bond pads disposed on the forward face such that an electrical connection can be made between the traces and the slider. Typically gold ball bonds are used to provide the connection between the FOS bond pads and the slider bond pads. In general, external solder bonders and ultrasonic bonding equipment is used to heat the ball bonds to cause sufficient reflow of the bonds to create an interconnect between the FOS bond pads and the slider bond pads. Difficulties arise in aligning and providing external heating systems to cause reflow of the ball bonds, and consequently a weak interconnect can result. A weak interconnect leads to an increased potential failure mode of the electrical connection between the slider bond pads and the FOS bond pads. Embodiments of the present invention address to these and other problems, and offer other advantages over the prior art.